


Just Let it Be

by Luddleston



Series: Cross the Stars for You [4]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Anal Sex, Anxiety, Bottom Shiro, Comfort Sex, Cuddling, Established Relationship, Fluff and Smut, Kink Negotiation, M/M, Pre-Kerberos Mission, tiniest bit of military kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-14
Updated: 2017-12-14
Packaged: 2019-02-14 13:51:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13009188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luddleston/pseuds/Luddleston
Summary: Some nights, Shiro doesn't want to be a renowned pilot or an officer of the Garrison, or the name at the top of the simulation time records.Some nights, he just wants to be Matt's boyfriend, nothing else.





	Just Let it Be

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes, you think of a good line, and then you try to write a whole thing around it, and it dissolves into mostly sass and smut. 
> 
> Anyway, just in case you were wondering, I TOTALLY MADE UP THEIR RANKS. I also totally made up the command system in the Garrison, it is all a lie and completely inaccurate. 
> 
> If there's a time where they say something in the show that conflicts with this.... I probably just don't remember it. Let me live in my fantasy world where I totally stole the designations from Mass Effect.

By the fifth day of the Garrison's yearly recruitment tour, Shiro was dead on his feet. 

On a normal day, he might be asked to talk to potential recruits from time to time, and he didn't mind that. But spending five straight days standing in front of a crowd and smiling while Iverson gave the same bland presentation over and over was close to how he imagined hell. Shiro had always hated being stuck in front of a crowd, now he was doing it all day for two entire weeks. Just fourteen days of posturing, hand-shaking, and having about two thousand pictures taken of him. 

He wasn't gonna make it. 

The only thing that kept him from succumbing to the urge he had to fake a case of food poisoning and lock himself in self-inflicted solitary confinement for the next nine days was the representative from the science department. Iverson may have been pissed that their department head said he could only spare a lieutenant, but Shiro was overjoyed, because Matt Holt was the only person keeping him from losing his goddamn mind. When he shouldered his way up to stand next to Shiro during every presentation, even though that wasn't the way he planned it, Shiro had a reminder that he hadn't quite yet died and gone to inferno. Hell wouldn't have that smile, or that reassuring look from behind his glasses.

And hell wouldn't have Matt knocking on his hotel room door after hours, getting louder and louder until Shiro finally heard him, pulled his headphones out, and opened the door.

"Captain Shirogane," Matt said, knuckles raised like he could've kept increasing volume if Shiro took any longer. His voice was all of the smooth, crisp professionality the Garrison expected of them for the tour. The cheeky grin plastered to his face was not. 

"Holt," Shiro said, because the door was still open, and last name or rank was standard.

"Gonna let me in?" Matt asked, not dropping his confidence an inch. The Garrison-approved formality dropped straight to the ground at the sound of his name, though.

Shiro's fingers tightened on the doorknob. "I shouldn't—we're not supposed to—"

Matt just tossed his head and rolled his eyes, then ducked right under Shiro's arm and into his room. Shiro took a cursory glance down the hall both ways to make sure nobody was watching a lieutenant walking into an officer's room after hours. It'd raise suspicions. There was no reason for Matt to be stopping by at half-past ten, except for—Matt raised himself onto his tiptoes as soon as Shiro closed the door and met him in a soft kiss—except for the obvious. 

"Nice digs," Matt said, looking appreciatively around the suite. "I _barely_ got a single room, and that was only 'cause they thought my dad was gonna be the science officer on this trip. Your bed looks like three of mine." He doubted that one. 

"Yeah, well, perks of being an officer, I guess," he said, unenthused. 

"You making it through alright?" Matt asked, sitting sideways on the couch and stretching out his legs. Like Shiro, he was in civvies; a worn-out T-shirt with his high school's science club logo and a pair of black sweats. He'd kicked off his shoes at the door. They were the only regulation article of clothing he'd had on. Well. Shiro couldn't exactly speak to what he was wearing under the sweats, but he could hazard a guess, and going commando wasn't regulation. "You look worn out." 

Shiro dropped into the chair facing him, leaning his head over the back of it, all his frustration escaping his chest in a strangled groan. "If I have to shake another person's hand, I swear to god, my arm's gonna fall off," he said. "My face hurts from smiling. Actually hurts. Do you believe that? I know they want the Garrison to be approachable, but. God _damn."_ He reached up to rub the bridge of his nose, trying to smooth out the wrinkles he was probably getting between his eyebrows. 

Matt, who genuinely liked talking to people about science all day, just shrugged. "Yeah, it's gonna be a long couple of weeks for you, huh? I would not wanna be an introvert right about now." Matt had actually been happy to get out of the lab and go somewhere he could lure unsuspecting high-schoolers into letting him talk their ear off. 

"That's an understatement," Shiro said. 

"Hey. C'mere." 

When Shiro looked up, Matt had his arms outstretched, beckoning him over. He hauled himself up and sat down where Matt made room for him between his legs, laying his cheek against Matt's chest. Shiro let out a messy exhale and closed his eyes. He could feel the bags he was starting to get under them. 

Matt didn't touch him too much, just let Shiro settle against him, one hand on his shoulder, the other resting overtop of his hand on Matt's chest. "I didn't think I'd be so drained," Shiro said. "We're not even halfway done." 

"Hey, it's been non-stop trying to impress people, giving speeches, and making sure you're doing things exactly to the letter. Two weeks packed full of stuff that makes you anxious? Yeah, you're gonna get tired, Shiro." 

"I'm alright at following regulation," Shiro argued. 

"Oh, believe me, I know you are. We would've gotten caught kissing somewhere at least five times by now if you weren't," Matt said. "But you don't like having command breathing down your neck, especially not when it's Iverson, which I can seriously understand. That guy's a piece of work." 

"I'd probably be less anxious if I wasn't worried about somebody finding you making middle-of-the-night trips to my hotel room in your pajamas, too," Shiro said. 

Matt froze, tensed up under him. "Shit, sorry, I didn't—" he moved like he was going to get up and go back where he came from, and Shiro wrapped an arm around his chest to get him to stay on the couch. 

"I'd be even more messed up if you weren't here." 

Matt settled back into him with a huff of laughter and curled his arms around Shiro, hugging him close to his chest. He pressed his lips to Shiro's temple, and it made a few strands of his hair stick there for a second. Shiro loosened his grip once he was sure Matt wasn't going to walk out and hugged him back, his hand splayed across Matt's side, his skin warm through the thin fabric of his T-shirt. He'd had that thing since they were cadets. Shiro remembered it from the nights Matt spent awake studying, the light of his computer turning his face blue. And he remembered the sleep-deprived, delirious smile Matt gave him the next morning when he proclaimed that he'd aced his test, and the way it had made his heartbeat stutter off track for the first time. 

Shiro turned his face so he could lay a kiss on Matt's chest, right where his heart was. "Sappy," Matt said, but his voice was muffled because he had his face buried in Shiro's hair, which was still a little damp from his shower. 

"God, I'm glad you ended up on this trip." 

He could feel Matt's breastbone move under his head as he laughed. "Someone had to keep you from going crazy, and Iverson wasn't up to it," he said. 

Shiro's hand dropped down from Matt's ribs to his hip, curling in. He scooted up so that when he turned his head, his mouth was on Matt's neck, pressing gentle kisses into the skin below his jaw, and then further down. Matt's hand curled into the fabric of his T-shirt, his other skating over Shiro's bicep. 

"Hey, Captain." Matt ducked his head so he could whisper it right in Shiro's ear. "Wanna have some fun?" 

"What kind of fun?" Shiro asked, but the cadence of Matt's voice and the way he spread his legs a little wider made that question just too easy to answer. "You wanna play a board game? I didn't bring any, myself, but I'm sure you packed Jenga or something." 

He stood as he spoke, backing up until the two of them were standing next to the bed. Matt stepped closer to him, his hands curling around Shiro's biceps. His head was still tilted coquettishly down, but there was nothing sutbtle about the way he replied with, "I think we're a little old for those kinds of games, sir." 

Shiro was expecting him to drop to his knees, or tip his head back and bare his throat, or extend his wrists and ask Shiro to hold him down. Any of the crazy things he did when they played like this, twisting the system that kept them in separate rooms every night. He was expecting a play of submission, a, "yes, sir," to everything he said. Not that Shiro knew what to do with authority in the bedroom, even if it was fake authority. 

He wasn't ready when Matt tightened his grip and shoved him onto his back on the bed, clambering on top of him and pinning him firmly using whatever he remembered from his combat training. If Shiro had been fighting back, Matt would've ended up flat on his ass, but he had the element of surprise going for him. 

Surprise. That might've been a word for it. The thing that really had Shiro's breath sticking in his chest, his body freezing in place, his eyes going wide, was arousal, burning all down the length of his spine. Unexpected. Shiro thought he would've known by now if he had a thing for people holding him down. He'd done enough hand-to-hand. 

Matt watched him like he was a very important piece of an experiment, like any reaction had to be catalogued in perfect detail for future reference. His glasses slipped down his nose. His hands were still tight around Shiro's wrist; his weight was still heavy on Shiro's hips. He hadn't stopped holding him down. 

Shiro licked his lips before he spoke. 

_"Fuck."_

Matt's calculated stare broke into a smile, something like relief in the space around his eyebrows. "Nice. Thought you were gonna punish me for that one," he said. Mostly a joke, because Shiro wasn't into that kind of thing. They tried the whole _I've been a bad boy_ routine once, and just. No. 

"No, it's fine," Shiro said. "I like being underneath you." 

"Well, I couldn't be too sure. It's usually _me_ working underneath _you,_ sir," Matt said, even though the chain of command definitely didn't work that way, with the two of them in different departments and all. But this was the game they liked to play, where Shiro was his CO and Matt had to do what he said. "My orders?" 

He worked around a response, but all of them rose to his mind in the harsh, clipped way he nagged at the cadets when they were being stupid. He'd spent all day being pissed off at people. He couldn't even pretend to be pissed off at Matt. 

"Lieutenant—" he stopped, sighed. He was done with orders right now, giving or receiving. "Hey, Matt?" He got another one of those inquisitive looks in response. "I don't think I can, uh. I don't think I can do this tonight." 

Matt let go of his wrists, swung a leg over until he was sitting on the bed next to him instead of looming over him. "Yeah?" he said, as he re-settled himself. "Did I go a little too far?" 

He hadn't. He'd know if he had. They had words for that, after Matt got really into research and spent a whole lot of time on a BDSM forum. 

"No, it's just. No." Shiro sat up a bit, still resting on one elbow so he was positioned below Matt. "You're good. I mean, normally I'd be into that. I'd be _really_ into that. But tonight, I'm just…" He reached for Matt and got an armful of him, another gentle, but solid hug. "I don't want to be an officer tonight. I don't want to be Garrison. I just want… I want…" 

"It's okay," Matt said, the flirtatiousness dropping out of his voice. 

"I just want to be your boyfriend tonight," Shiro said, pulling Matt closer to him, and into the long, slow kiss he'd wanted to give him. 

When they parted, Matt's glasses slipped down his nose again. Shiro nudged them up at the corner, and got an affectionate smile for his troubles, the analytical way Matt had watched him suffusing into the same careful look he'd had since their first kiss. Like instead of cataloguing reactions, he was just planning the next kiss. 

"You're my boyfriend every night," Matt reminded him. 

"I know." Another kiss. Matt pressed him back onto the bedspread again, but this time, he wasn't starting a play-fight. A slow, familiar heat settled over him, like Matt was curing some homesick ache Shiro didn't know he'd had. One kiss turned into another, trailing into a third and more. It reminded him of their first, but it was so clearly their thousandth, the two of them falling into a well-worn rhythym without having to stumble their way into something that felt good. 

And it did feel good, to know someone this well. To easily find the gap where he could slip Matt's glasses off his face, to know the exact distance away to lay them so nobody would roll on top. And to be known, Matt's thumb on his temple where he could rub away the start of Shiro's headaches. To be a man in love and know he was loved in return. 

His hand crept up Matt's thigh, and they parted. Matt squinted down at him, and he couldn't tell if it was confusion or if he just couldn't see. Probably a little of both. 

"I thought you didn't want to have sex tonight," Matt said. 

"I didn't say that," Shiro said, his thumb delineating the curve between Matt's thigh and his ass. "I just want to be really vanilla about it." 

"Yeah?" 

"Oh yeah. Missionary position with a lot of eye contact, and everything," Shiro said. 

"It sounds very sweet until you think about exactly how close I'll have to be for that eye contact to actually be, you know, contact. Probably too close. I'm gonna make it weird." 

"You wouldn't be you if you didn't." He punctuated it with a kiss just above the neckline of Matt's shirt. 

"See, you say that like a compliment, but I'm pretty sure it was an insult to my sexual prowess. I'm onto you, Shirogane." He could act offended, but he didn't seem to mind when Shiro pulled him into another kiss and stuck his hand under the waistband of Matt's pants to grab his ass. His guess about Matt's underwear had been on the nose. 

"Yeah, you're really _onto me,"_ he said, and Matt helpfully reminded him of that by rolling his hips against Shiro's. 

"You go get the stuff," Matt said, "I can't see." 

"What makes you think I packed it?" Shiro asked, even though he definitely had a bottle of lube packed between a bunch of his socks and a very smashed-in box of condoms on the very bottom of his suitcase. 

Matt just wiggled his eyebrows, and Shiro sighed and got up to dig through his suitcase. "It was a lucky guess," he said, "but I figured that with the two of us living on the same hallway, with no curfew, you might be thinking about it. Because I was thinking about it." 

Shiro crossed the room back to the bed and picked up Matt's glasses, setting them safely on the nightstand and replacing them with the lube and one of the condoms. "Yeah, I guess I just tried not to. Because the rest of the officers are also on the same hallway." 

"You worry too much," Matt said, patting him on the cheek and pulling him down onto the bed by the hem of his T-shirt. 

"I think I worry an appropriate amount," he said, and Matt pulled harder, until Shiro overbalanced and fell on top of him on the bed. Shiro caught himself with his hands on either side of Matt's head and bent to kiss him, before pulling away and yanking his shirt off over the back of his head. He didn't miss the way Matt stared at his abs while he did it. 

"You, uh," and his eyes went up to Shiro's chest instead, which was just as flattering, "you look good." 

"I look the same as always," Shiro said, while Matt wrestled himself out of his own shirt, a task that was made difficult by the fact that he was laying on his back on the bed. When he finally freed himself, his hair was sticking up even more than usual. 

"Yeah, and you always look—" he gestured unelaboratively. "Just. Wow. Can I take your pants off?" 

"Just come here," Shiro said, taking a seat with his back against the pillows stacked up at the headboard. There were way too many of them and the bed was a thousand times softer than his dorm back at Headquarters. He relaxed back into it, opening his arms for Matt, who wasted no time in sitting up and moving over to him. 

Matt arranged himself across Shiro's lap, pulling him down until Shiro's lips met his, Matt's fingers petting the short hair on the back of his neck. Shiro slid his palms down Matt's back, pressing harder on the places where he knew Matt's muscles knotted up after he leaned over a computer all day. 

Matt dropped back, using all his weight to tip Shiro over, laughing triumphantly when he managed to pull Shiro on top of him before going back to kissing him. This was Shiro's favorite thing about having a room to themselves for the night: they had time to mess around, to take it slow without worrying that Matt's roommate or one of the other officers was going to come knocking. It was rare that they got as long as they wanted, uninterrupted, and they took advantage of it, trading long, slow kisses and touching as much of each other as they could reach. 

They both lay on their sides, face-to-face and still kissing, even though the perfect angle was hard to keep in that position. Shiro had a hand tucked under Matt's knee, pulling his leg up over Shiro's hip, his grip adjusting and his hand sliding up Matt's thigh when Matt squeezed one of his pecs. "So you've still got that weird thing for my chest," Shiro said. 

"'S not weird. Not with a body like yours." 

It took him a minute to come up with a properly snarky retort, and in that time, Matt rolled his hips against Shiro's and both of them moaned. He forgot what he was going to say, and he also forgot what he was supposed to be sassing Matt about. He could feel Matt getting hard against him and reacted accordingly, turning it into a slow grind, rhythmless, because there wasn't really a good way to do it in this position. 

Well, except for that time when Matt had spooned up behind him and fucked his thighs. That had been good. And a complete mess. 

Shiro could feel his whole body heating up, the pressure of Matt's cock against his getting more and more difficult to bear the longer they kept it up. He grabbed Matt's ass through his sweats and Matt scraped his teeth over Shiro's lower lip in response. Shiro tangled his fingers in Matt's hair, pulling just a little, and Matt started making all these sharp, breathy little noises, the kinds they'd had to stifle back when they shared a room in the cadet barracks, which had remarkably thin walls. Shiro sealed his mouth over Matt's like he had back then, not that he needed to keep him quiet here. 

"God," Matt sighed, pulling away only to lean back in and kiss him again, like he had to have one more. "Shiro. C'mon, let's. Let's. I dunno. What do you want to do?" 

What did he want to do. Everything they could, for as long as they could stand it. He wanted to feel everything his boyfriend could give him, wanted to be loved, wanted to be _taken._

"Fuck me." 

It was a long moment before he got the breathy response. _"Shit._ You drive me crazy, you know that?" Matt rolled his hips against Shiro's again, hitching his leg a little higher up Shiro's thigh so the angle was a better, and then he did it again, until both of them got caught up for way too long.

"Okay, okay. Hold on," Shiro said, because he knew all too well that they could keep going like that until both of them came. And he didn't want to waste one of the few nights when they had the time to do whatever they wanted. Whatever they _needed._

And he needed Matt inside of him. 

They separated just enough to get rid of the rest of their clothing, but not far enough that Matt couldn't kick him in the shins when Shiro asked if he planned on leaving his socks on again this time. When they came together again, Matt was straddling Shiro, sitting on his stomach, the head of his cock barely a half-inch above Shiro's abs. Shiro wrapped his hand around it and liked the way Matt's eyes squeezed shut and his mouth dropped open. 

"Touch me?" Shiro asked, and Matt immediately started reaching around behind himself to figure out where they left the lube. He patted around for a few moments, then frowned, and flipped up the edge of the blanket.

"I'm pretty sure we lost it," he said, peering over the edge of the bed. 

"Matt, I swear to god—"

"Nope, didn't lose it. Under the sheets. How." 

"Well, good. Come here." 

It took some doing to get Matt off Shiro's lap and in between his legs without kicking him in the face, but they got there eventually. Matt grabbed one of the pillows from the head of the bed and nudged Shiro up until he could fit it under his hips. "So things won't be such a pain in the ass," he said, and Shiro rolled his eyes, trying not to smile and failing. 

Matt leaned his cheek against the inside of Shiro's knee while he figured out how to close the bottle with lube all over his fingers. The gesture, and his look of concentrated frustration when physics refused to work for him, were adorable, and Shiro put his hand in Matt's unruly hair and parted his bangs out of his eyes. 

"You ready?" Matt asked, once he finally remembered he had another hand, tilting his chin up and squinting so he could gauge the look on Shiro's face. Shiro was pretty sure Matt was too nearsighted to actually see him. 

"Yeah, I'm ready." 

"Good."

There was no other way to say it. Matt was good with his fingers. It only took him minutes to turn Shiro to mush under him, his pace steady and even, smooth strokes that opened him up with a practiced kind of ease. Matt bent over him and kissed his torso while he did it—kissed his chest, mostly. He had the timing down to as much a science as he had anything else; he curled his fingers up against Shiro's prostate at the same time he ran the flat of his tongue over his nipple, and Shiro's back bowed a little, curving to push Matt's fingers in deeper. 

"There?" Matt asked, and Shiro could feel his exhale against his wet skin, which all turned to goosebumps. 

_"Ah!_ Yeah, there." 

Matt grinned and turned to kiss the inside of Shiro's knee. "You alright?" 

"Yeah, fine, _god,_ don't stop, just—" 

"Not gonna stop," he said, but he avoided Shiro's prostate on the next pass, turning his wrist so his fingers weren't angled right. He was doing it on purpose, then. 

"If you're—if you're just gonna tease me," he said, "then I'll— _ah."_ Right in the middle of him accusing Matt of being a tease, Matt ducked and ran his tongue over the head of Shiro's cock. 

"You'll what?" Matt asked, looking sweet as could be. 

"I'll—" was all he got out before Matt went down again, wrapped his lips around Shiro's cock and sucked, before pulling right off again. "Okay, cut it out— _Matt,_ stop teasing me." 

"You ready?" He pressed his fingers in again, this time to gauge whether he'd done enough actual prep between driving Shiro completely insane. 

"Yeah, I am. C'mon. I want you." 

"Okay, good, yeah. Let's go." Matt looked around for a few seconds, then shrugged, like _ah, fuck it,_ and wiped his fingers off on his thigh, extricating the condom from the pile of blankets it'd gotten lost in. Shiro shifted up onto his elbows while Matt fumbled with it—a combination of shaky hands and a general inability to see what he was doing if it wasn't within six inches of his face. 

"You need some help, there?" Shiro asked, and even though it was a genuine offer, not teasing, Matt made a little angry huff. 

"Nope," he said, and pushed Shiro back onto the bed again, a little more gently this time, as though Matt had suddenly forgotten how to hold up his own weight and was pressing Shiro down with it. "How do you want it?" he asked, "nice and slow?" His cock pushed against Shiro's ass once, not in, not angled well enough to fuck him. 

"Yeah, that's good." 

Matt tilted his head to the side, reaching between them to position himself right. "How'd you put it that one time? Making love?" 

"That was one time, I said that. One time." Shiro rolled his hips, trying to push himself into Matt's lap. 

"Yep, and that one time, you sounded like a super old dude, and it was hilarious," Matt said. 

"It wasn't—I didn't—I thought it was kind of sweet, you know? And I still do, actually, it's like—" 

He was cut off by Matt winning the argument the best way he knew how: by shoving his dick in Shiro's ass. Shiro thought this was a perfectly acceptable way to win an argument, and he pulled Matt close enough to kiss him while he did it, fitting them together more perfectly every second. 

"Is that…?" Matt asked, and Shiro could tell he was trying to go slow, but he every so often, he hitched his hips forward in a quick, jerky thrust, like he just couldn't help himself. Shiro's heart clenched in his chest, because the fact that Matt was trying to make it good for him when he was almost too overwhelmed to do slow and steady was just… 

"It's good, it's so good," he said, and when Matt tipped his head to the side, Shiro took the opportunity to kiss his neck, soft at first, then with more and more pressure the lower he got. Once he was sure his lips were below the collar line of Matt's uniform, he sucked harder, scraping his teeth over Matt's skin. In response, Matt's fingers tightened on Shiro's sides and he fucked him as deep as he could, then rolled his hips, the same way Shiro did when he wanted to fuck him, but he couldn't bring himself to pull out even an inch. It was cute, and made even more so by the fact that Matt was making soft, breathy moans of his name around cursing more impressively than most of the cadets.

Shiro pulled away once he was satisfied with the mark he'd left on Matt's neck, and Matt took that opportunity to fit their mouths together again, not kissing so much as pushing, still fucking him with as steady a pace as he could. "Fuck," Matt gasped as he pulled away with a particularly loud sound, "shit. _Fuck,_ I love you, Shiro. You feel so good, I love—love that you let me do this to you, love that you're mine." 

Shiro echoed each with, "yes, yes, yes, _fuck,_ yes, I'm yours." 

Matt gave him another noisy kiss, then huffed a laugh against his lips. "You're close?" 

Of course he was, he was swearing already. "Yes, fuck, of course I'm—I'm close, you— _hah_ —you feel so good. Always forget how much I love having you inside me." 

Matt's hips stuttered again and he dropped his forehead to Shiro's chest. "Can I—?" he started, his hands firm on Shiro's hips. 

"Yeah, god, yes, Matt, fuck me." 

Matt couldn't exactly set a pace that was _brutal_ by any means, not the way Shiro could, because he wasn't really strong enough to hold him down and ruin him, but that wasn't what Shiro needed, anyway. He just watched the way Matt's composure broke down completely, his mouth dropping open, eyes screwing shut, even the constant stream of obscenity and innuendo cutting off. Matt's thrusts were jerky and uneven now, but that wasn't what gave away how close he was.

No, that was the breathless whisper of, _"Takashi,"_ against his chest, which preceded a sharp gasp and an unsteady moan. The, "fuck, Takashi, I'm—" was pretty telling, too, and Shiro pulled Matt in to kiss him through the whole of it.

It took Matt a minute to blink his way back into reality, but as soon as he did, he was on Shiro again, pulling him into a sitting position at the head of the bed and then curling around him, his hand between Shiro's legs, skirting over his cock. "What do you want, babe?" he asked, and Shiro laid his hand over Matt's, pressing him into a surer grip. 

"Just this," he said, bringing one leg up so he could rest his knee over the opposite ankle, and Matt tucked his head into the space between Shiro's jaw and his shoulder as he started to move, not bothering with teasing him this time, thank god. 

"Like this?" Matt asked, jerking him off steady and firm, like he was masturbating.

"Yeah, like that, babe, just like—fuck, I'm so close, just—" 

Matt tipped his head up to kiss him, and Shiro sighed against his lips, pushing his hips up into Matt's fist, every muscle in him going tight for a second before—

 _"Matthew,"_ he moaned, coming all over Matt's fist and his stomach, pulling Matt into another, longer kiss. 

It was sweet for a moment, Matt settling him with gentle kisses, and then he said, "ugh, I have—I'm gonna go ruin some hotel washcloths." 

Now wasn't that a mental image he hadn't asked for. 

Matt shoved the washcloth he'd desecrated into the trash, which Shiro approved of, because he did _not_ want any other human being to have to deal with that. By the time he came back to bed, Shiro had pulled the blankets up to his shoulders. Matt lifted a corner and got in beside him, wiggling closer until he could kiss him. 

"So. How was that for stress relief?" Matt asked, and Shiro just shook his head. He couldn't stop himself from smiling, though.

"I actually stopped thinking about this stupid recruitment thing for fifteen minutes, so. Alright, I guess?" 

"Fuck you, I lasted longer than fifteen minutes." 

Shiro dragged him in to kiss him out of the argument, which, for once, seemed to work. After, Matt curled to rest his head on Shiro's chest, both of them still sort of waiting for their breathing to even out. 

"You have to go back to your own room eventually," Shiro said, but he held Matt tighter. 

"Set the alarm for four-thirty, I'll get up and sneak back out," Matt suggested. 

"Early." 

"Yeah, early. I'll give you some more 'stress relief' before I go," he said, and then laughed. Shiro frowned and reached for the alarm clock. He set it for four-fifteen, and then re-settled his arm around Matt. "Do you think," Matt began, "if it weren't for the Garrison, we would be a normal couple? You know, like, living together, going on dates in public, that kind of thing?" 

They'd been on dates in public before, but that was before Shiro got to be so well-known. They probably still could, if they were far enough away from the Garrison and from people who knew too much trivia about him. 

"I think if it weren't for the Garrison, I never would have met you." Shiro brushed Matt's bangs out of his face. 

"Okay, that's fair," Matt said, "but let's just say we did, somehow. Just two normal people who met… I don't know, at a coffeeshop, or online, or however people meet people." 

"I think it'd be a little more normal," Shiro admitted. They probably wouldn't have that whole _yes, sir_ kink, which was definitely a step toward normal. 

"I just think sometimes, we…" Matt shifted closer to him, put his arm around Shiro's waist and held on, his fingers indenting in Shiro's skin. "I sometimes think that if we didn't have to go sneaking around like this all the time, we'd be married by now, or something." 

"We still could," Shiro said, and then regretted saying it, because even though they _technically_ still could, it would involve so much subterfuge, he'd feel more like he was in a spy movie than his own wedding. He'd have to get the officiant to sign an NDA, or something. 

There were married couples in the Garrison, Matt's parents, for one, but one of them was always a civillian. The anti-fraternization policies discouraged most people from dating within the Garrison, and they found someone elsewhere, if they got married at all. 

"Nah, I want a giant, super-public proposal, babe. Cameras and shit. I want a whole bunch of random onlookers to tell their friends how cute we are." 

"Alright, fine, I'll get down on one knee halfway during Iverson's presentation." 

Matt slapped him weakly on the shoulder. "You better not. I will say no. Don't test me." 

"Okay, fine. I'll ask you once we get back from space." 

They were still classified as "under consideration" for the Kerberos mission, but there were no other candidates with the same status, so they'd been talking about going to space together for weeks. 

"Sure. I'll say yes when we get back from space," Matt agreed, curling up closer to him. 

Shiro always fell asleep faster with Matt next to him, ever since they'd started sharing one of the tiny bunks as cadets. He knew he wasn't going to get a full eight hours, not with Matt's plan to wake up before the crack of dawn and fool around again. But at least he'd rest easy with Matt asleep in his arms. 

In the dark hotel room, it was easy to imagine they were hundreds of miles away from their rank and responsibilities. He didn't have to think about their recruitment tomorrow, in fact, he could imagine it didn't exist, and that the only thing he had to do tomorrow was spend the day in this bed with Matt. 

For tonight, he had a few precious hours where he didn't have to be anyone at all.

**Author's Note:**

> Visit me on tumblr @luddlestons or on my NSFW tumblr @seldula! I also have a blog specifically for writing @bambi-simmons, which is basically just full of VLD fanfiction.


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